The ribbon is cut to begin the Survivors lap during a American Cancer Society Relay for Life event. J. Scott Park | MLive.com file

MUSKEGON
COUNTY, MI – This year's Relay for Life event in Muskegon County will include two
unique features: a vocal performance by a former TV show contestant and a once-in-a-generation
opportunity for locals to enroll in an historic cancer study.

CPS-3, which is a genetics- and geographic location-focused study,
could lead researchers to major breakthroughs in cancer prevention, according
to Julie Yonkers, an American Cancer Society volunteer who is leading efforts to
get Muskegon residents registered in the study during the overnight event, which begins Friday, May 31.

The study targets adults ages 30 to 65 with no personal history of cancer, excluding
basal or squamous cell skin cancer and is the nonprofit's fourth major cancer
study and the third and final installment of a prevention studies series that
launched in 1959.

Yonkers
said interested registrants will only have from 5 p.m. to 9 p.m. to register for
the study on May 31.

"We
have four hours to enroll as many as close to 184 people as we can," Yonkers
said.

Muskegon
will host the only West Michigan enrollment site this year and the organization
aims to collectively enroll about a half-million participants across the country, Yonkers said.

During this remembrance segment of the event, which will
begin at 9:30 p.m., Yacoub will perform a cover of "Hallelujah" along with "Never
Alone" by the Grammy Award-winning pop country group, Lady Antebellum, said Hannah
Smoker, a Grand Rapids-based community representative for the American Cancer
Society.

Yonkers
said the evening programming will give attendees "a feel for what Relay's all
about," but volunteers hope attendees will also participate in other
planned events such as the "Survivor Lap," which honors former cancer patients who
have successfully fought the illness.

Mary
Ball, a CPS-3 specialist for the nonprofit, has said that the organization selected
Relay for Life as an enrollment site because the occasion's attendees tend to be
more invested in cancer prevention.

Ball
also said that the CPS-3 effort will target historically underrepresented
groups such as African Americans and Latinos because epidemiologists will be able to better examine cancer-related risk factors among these groups if their health history is included their research.

The
free enrollment process comprises of giving consent, completing a survey,
providing a blood sample and taking a waist measurement.

The
event will take place from 2 p.m. on May 31 to 2 p.m. on June 1 at Reeths-Puffer
High School, 1545 N. Roberts Road.

According
to the website for the Muskegon event, 55 teams and 579 participants had raised
$92,188 for the event as of Wednesday evening.